Impact of women’s board presence on firm performance: An empirical analysis on the Italian capital market

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Abstract

This paper aims to empirically verify if the presence of women on the board of directors produces positive effects on performance results achieved by a sample of listed companies on the Italian stock market. Although many studies have investigated the relationship between women on board and corporate governance effectiveness, research results are inconclusive regarding their impact on corporate performance. After describing the most recent literature review on the topic, this article analyzes a set of board attributes in relation to the presence of women on the board for 26 Italian-listed companies for 2019 years. The empirical results show a positive correlation between the share of women on the board of directors and sampled companies’ performance. This result is consistent what has been shown by recent corporate literature (Gupta et al., 2023; EmadEldeen et al., 2021; Magnanelli et al., 2021; Song et al., 2020). Therefore, the results confirm the importance of women’s presence on the board of directors in influencing the financial performance of companies. This research, therefore, helps provide corporate governance guidance for board members, and professionals looking to refine strong performance.

Keywords: Board Diversity, Board of Directors, Corporate Governance, Firm Performance, Women on Board

Authors’ individual contribution: Conceptualization — P.C. and M.C.; Methodology — P.C. and M.C.; Validation — P.C. and M.C.; Formal Analysis — P.C. and M.C.; Investigation — P.C. and M.C.; Resources — P.C. and M.C.; Data Curation — P.C. and M.C.; Writing — Original Draft — P.C. and M.C.; Writing — Review & Editing — P.C. and M.C.; Visualization — P.C. and M.C.; Supervision — P.C. and M.C.; Project Administration — P.C. and M.C.

Declaration of conflicting interests: The Authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.

JEL Classification: G32, G34, L25, M14

Received: 11.04.2023
Accepted: 23.10.2023
Published online: 24.10.2023

How to cite this paper: Capuano, P., & Carabelli, M. (2023). Impact of women’s board presence on firm performance: An empirical analysis on the Italian capital market. Journal of Governance & Regulation, 12(4), 92–100. https://doi.org/10.22495/jgrv12i4art9